CHS wrestlers finish in final four at state duals

Carrollton’s Ben Pasiuk (black singlet) takes down Ashland’s Jake Visintine before pinning him in the 132 lb. match of the OHSAA state dual quarterfinals.

COLUMBUS – It was a weekend of celebration for the Carrollton Warrior matmen as they traveled to Columbus to take part in the school’s first trip to the Ohio High School Athletic Association (OHSAA) Team Duals wrestling tournament Feb. 12 at St. Johns Arena.

The weekend started with a community sendoff and police escort through Carrollton and Dellroy as the Warriors hit the road to the tournament.

The No. 3-seeded Carrollton Warriors, who were predicted to fall to the No. 6-seeded Ashland Arrows 26-24 by borofanohio.net, opened the tournament with a 34-32 win in the Division II state quarterfinals over Ashland.

The Arrows opened the match with a 7-5 decision over Carrollton’s Nate Blake to take an early 3-0 lead.

Justin Shaw (138 lbs.) and Adam Shaw (145 lbs.) increased Carrollton’s lead to 19-9 with a pair of wins.

Ashland’s Sid Ohl won by technical fall over Noah Carrothers, inching the Arrows within five points (19-14).

Carrollton sophomore Brandon Daniels (160 lbs.) won by a 15-2 major decision and seniors Brenton Miller (170 lbs.) and Aidan Pasiuk (182 lbs.) won by pin, increasing the Warriors’ lead to 34-14, mathematically the Warriors couldn’t lose with the lead they had.

The Warriors took a forfeit at 195 lbs.

Carrollton junior Noah Rutledge (220 lbs.) and sophomore Tavis Rutledge (285 lbs.) both fell by pin in the final two matches.

“With that win it secures a top four spot as a team, that’s pretty nice,” said Carrollton Coach Ken Pasiuk. “You watch that match we just wrestled, we’re wrestling well as a team and we’re wrestling some better kids.”

“Nate Blake went out there and wrestled a ranked kid (in the state) and only gave up a decision and Noah Carrothers only gave up a technical fall to save points,” Coach Pasiuk mentioned. “All those points are huge…honestly you can’t do that if you have selfish teammates; we don’t. They’re having fun and they’re working together, it’s exciting.”

“Getting here (to the state tournament) is one thing, deserving to be here is another but when you win a match here, you make your mark saying you deserve to be here,” said Pasiuk. “In my opinion that just proved that we deserved to be here. It wasn’t luck; we didn’t get here by chance. We deserve to be here and we proved it on the mat by winning that match.”

“We have such a great fan base,” said Pasiuk. “They drove two and half hours to spend their whole day watching us wrestle. That is remarkable.”

With the win, the Warriors advanced to the state semifinals to take on the No. 2-seeded Wauseon Indians.